Albania, Kosovo and Macedonia - Summer 2018

Durrës Shkodër Kruja

Arrival of the ferry at the port of Durrës at around 8. Unlike what we read in some travel diaries, inside the port, after the first checks and showing the vehicle registration document and ID papers, we find the only office for car insurance coverage right in front of us: 49 euros to insure our Clio for 15 days (we'll leave the country heading toward Kosovo and re-enter from Macedonia making use of the same insurance). I politely decline a currency exchange, and we leave the port immediately coming to terms with the GPS on our tablets/smartphones. The official currency is the lek, exchange rate with the euro at about 125 lek. Having already read that in several places of tourist interest the euro is nevertheless accepted, we waste no more time and begin our adventure heading toward Shkodër and its lake, on the border with Montenegro.

The first impact with Albanian roads reassures us, we manage to keep up with the satellite navigator without too many problems, until the moment when suddenly we find ourselves in a queue 4 km from an urban center; the 100 km of the route that we were supposed to cover comfortably in less than 2 hours will turn into an odyssey of over 3 hours. At 12:30 we finally manage to park our car at the foot of the climb that leads to Rozafa Castle; not having lek available, we pay in euros both the parking attendant and the owner of the nearby restrooms, and they will cost us far more than the 100 lek per head paid for entry to the site. The legend about the castle tells of a woman walled up alive who made its construction possible; we spend a pleasant hour inside the fortification, admire the surrounding landscape, then drive to Shkodër, heading toward Kol Idromeno, the pedestrian street.

We take less time than expected for the transfer (the travel diaries we read, and the just-experienced ordeal of driving from Durrës, had led us to expect the worst), we manage to find a spot in the center and immediately withdraw the lek with which we'll pay for our first Albanian lunch; although I'm an expert with numbers and exchange rates, the imposition of only 4 denominations to select and the application of a 400 lek fee, rather than dividing the proposed amounts by 125, leads my brain to use one of the few dumb neurons available and the result is a withdrawal equivalent to 15 euros, heavily overtaxed…..

in the following minutes the neighboring neurons will compete to see who messes up worse… after about half an hour of wandering in the center I decide to withdraw a more respectable sum and sadly abandon the area immediately trying to also save on parking expenses what was gifted to all of Albania and to Mastercard in a momentary blackout. The center of Shkodër is certainly appreciable, the pedestrian promenade is pleasant, but in my opinion it's not worth more than the time we devoted to it. Before heading to the hotel in Krujë, by car we reach at 8 km distance the famous Ura e Mesit bridge; medieval architecture, with irregular arches, with sections at different inclines; its 100 meters lend themselves to exceptional photos.

We relax for a few minutes, then wait for a flock of sheep to pass and set off again toward Krujë, where we'll arrive after about 2 hours, and after tackling some stretches of dirt road at a snail's pace; in the following days I'll understand that it isn't a shortcut, but the main road, and that my GPS will be capable of proposing far worse routes than this later on; alas, on returning to Italy we'll note that some of our compatriots on scooters paid the consequences excessively, while quite a few others wrecked the sides of their cars in fateful collisions with Albanian drivers. A digression on hotels in Albania. Certainly the costs are far from comparable to Italian ones; the services at times manage to equal and even surpass Italian merits.

And so when booking accommodations in Albania, as in Kosovo and Macedonia, I decide to alternate days in special and more refined establishments with days devoted to saving; and so it happens that we find, a few km from Tirana, from Durrës, and near the main route to Kosovo, a lodging inside a famous castle, celebrated by stories and legends, in a city symbolic of anti-Ottoman resistance, which gave birth to the national hero Skanderbeg, ancient Albanian capital: Krujë (or Kruja). For 2 nights the crazy expense amounts to 45 euros breakfast included (and a welcome beer included); let's say it nicely combines economy with the maximum that Albanian hospitality can offer. From Emiliano (of Emiliano rooms) we don't ask for a wellness center, sauna, hammam, but what he offers at that price earns him all our esteem… and a well-deserved 10 on Booking.com.

To reach the accommodation you have to convince the guards at the entrance to the pedestrian area and the bazaar to let the car through, then you climb up a very steep road to the castle walls, of which today only a single tower remains; below our gaze, on one side the bazaar and the city, on the other the mountain; from the car park you reach in 30 seconds … I said 30 … but also 2 or 3 seconds with a jump… the spectacular castle museum, the true fortification/attraction of the site. Emiliano offers us his mother's menu for only 5 euros for the evening, and my kind consort at such a request can only agree!! What can I say? We spend the evening taking photos galore.. dining on the lawn that was probably the scene of battle in times gone by…. and we wage our only battle with the local cats that jump on the chairs to mark their territory and beg for their dinner.

Kruja and Tirana

We wake up to the rooster's crow, which has probably lost its clock, or perhaps its sight, and isn't very punctual in its work; and we also hear the "song" of many other animals coming from the valley. Having breakfast outdoors at the mercy of bees proves to be an impossible task, so between the alternative of eating in the room and the stone-walled hall with tapestries and fireplace… we prefer the second; it's summer and the fireplace is off, but from the photos of the castle covered in snow we sense how useful and evocative it must be in winter. Considering that the bazaar opens at 9, we leave the area with our car before it gets besieged by tourists; we head toward Tirana, with the intention of returning in the early afternoon to spend time also beyond the castle walls.

The GPS proposes an absurd alternative to reach the capital; after having followed the proposal for about 2 km through dirt roads, an intelligent neuron violently strikes the neighboring dumb one, a sharp pain in my head reminds me that I have a brain to use immediately to replace the crazy navigator; this time my intuition puts us on the right path, and at around 9:30 we're in the center of Tirana.

We find parking in the underground of Skanderbeg Square, and from there we move on foot to discover the capital; around the square are the most important attractions and monuments of Tirana, and it itself is a popular meeting place for those who want to rest on the "loungers," take a ride on the carousel, or simply defend themselves from the heat by passing over the fountains, as many children accompanied by their grandmothers do, and as my consort does in the grip of a "return to her roots"… We skip the visit of the Albanian National Museum and also of the mosque, closed for restoration; we don't go up the tower, not considering a panoramic view from just 20 meters above our heads appealing; we're not interested in BunkArt either; so we spend all our time in the city strolling along the pleasant boulevards, peeking into Tirana's nightlife venues, relaxing in the city parks, looking at th

e windows of design shops with prices unaffordable to most ordinary mortals of the Western world. We only enter the modern Orthodox Cathedral, to admire the great mosaic of Christ Pantocrator. At 2 PM our tour of the capital is already over. Back in Krujë we first visit the museum, then move on to the bazaar to buy souvenirs. The museum is truly a nice surprise, as imposing outside as it is interesting inside; we relive the pride of Albanians for their leader Skanderbeg, known in Italy as Giorgio Castriota, who faced and defeated the Ottoman army. The music of Amélie awaits us at the exit, an accordionist makes the atmosphere magical; we descend toward the bazaar and spend a couple of hours wandering aimlessly, with the sole intent of buying some souvenirs, in the meantime also noting the presence of artisan workshops of considerable interest.

We have dinner early, then before falling asleep we study the route that in a few hours will take us to Kosovo.

Kosovo - Prizren

Kosovo is certainly not among the sought-after destinations for summer vacations, nor for cultural weekends; in fact, it absolutely doesn't exist among the proposed destinations, except in combination with neighboring Albania and Macedonia as a transit stop. Moreover, the recent past doesn't help reassure potential tourists to venture to the Kosovar borders, especially the borders with Serbia are still a matter of dispute between the 2 countries, despite most of the international community having recognized this small state, and since 2016 it has been practically demilitarized (with the exception of some sites of mostly religious interest, sometimes guarded even by our carabinieri, as I happened to see in Pristina). Per capita income is among the lowest in Europe, yet the vitality recorded in some urban centers leads us to think that a profound change is underway.

A predominantly Islamic country; official currency the euro. The idea of "passing through" Kosovo arose from my kind consort's desire to visit Albania, and my curiosity to push on toward Skopje, in Macedonia, and then toward the much-praised pearl of the Balkans, Ohrid. Studying the map, fiddling with GoogleMaps, the option of passing through Kosovo on the way out (from Krujë to Skopje) and returning from the border on Lake Ohrid (from the city of the same name toward Berat and Gjirokastër) is the only one that guarantees us quick transfers, allowing us stops also in the central part of Albania where there are sites of notable cultural and historical interest.

To evaluate the possibility of the crossing I start studying the political situation and search the internet for material from other travelers that might support and help me in the decision; to my surprise I discover that some tour operators have already used my "shortcut," and I also discover that the preconceptions about Kosovo, as indeed those that in the past were held about Albania and its people, are absolutely outdated. Of course, though, 3-4 travel diaries on the internet, against decades of preconceptions, don't entirely reassure me about staying in the country too long.

So I design an itinerary that with complete safety allows me this taste of Kosovo, visiting and overnighting in Prizren, then moving toward Macedonia with a brief excursion to the Gračanica Monastery, using more trafficked and passable roads compared to those that, though shorter, could involve long stretches of uneven or dirt roads. Once on the ground, once again my kind consort will insist that the excursion to Gračanica be extended to the Kosovar capital Pristina (they're barely a 5 km straight line apart), a city that on paper (and rightly so) I had ruled out as not very interesting compared to the other destinations of our long itinerary.

The other fears about using the car in Kosovo, about the transport and safekeeping of our valuables (don't imagine who knows what… but my camera, my smartphone, and my credit card have inestimable value to me…..!!) we address by booking parking at the hotel in Prizren and planning to keep the Clio stationary for the entire first day, and visual monitoring for the second day; not exactly a tourist's consideration, perhaps more a war-zone reporter's, but, as already written, on the ground we'll discover a whole different reality compared to the one told to us by the media every day for years. We cross the border between Albania and Kosovo traveling along a fantastic highway, new, smooth, among the mountains and greenery.

The Kosovar good morning we receive at the much-feared border, and in place of what would be very understandable checks, we're greeted by a smiling customs officer who tries to speak to us in Italian, winks at us, lets us pass through, but begs us to park just past the national border demarcation line to walk back a few meters and sign the supplementary policy for our car insurance (15 euros). In barely 20 minutes customs is cleared and we still find roads in surprisingly good condition. Only near the center of Prizren will we encounter slightly different road conditions, and only due to the GPS navigator will we end up in the middle of a mega traffic jam, and pass through brief stretches of uneven and dirt roads.

The Prizreni hotel is in a very central position, 10 meters from the river, and from an access bridge to the hotel itself and to the pedestrian area; behind our accommodation the climb to the Kaljaja fortress begins; 100 meters along the river are the city's main attractions, the Sinan Pasha Mosque and the 15th-century Ottoman bridge; everything else is anyway in the vicinity. We'll have difficulty finding the famous Orthodox Church of the Virgin of Ljeviš, a UNESCO Heritage site, vandalized several times, now closed, from the outside the signs of neglect and incivility are clearly visible. No information center, no paper guide in Italian, only a small and inaccurate map is provided to us at the hotel; fortunately our Lonely Planet "Western Balkans," though outdated, has some information about the town.

Souvenir prices are absolutely disproportionate compared to the locals' standard of living; we don't find Western fast food, but Kosovar "paninerie" with embarrassing prices (for 2, a dinner with drinks, burgers and fries at about 4 euros…); the lunch on arrival we enjoy at a restaurant on the river (ON… not near, not along the… ON THE RIVER!!) and I eat a whole freshly caught trout for just 5 euros!! We understand why the American restaurant giants don't even try to enter here… The view of the city from the top of the fortress makes us think of much better-known European cities (Budapest and Salzburg); the murals on the riverbanks, the numerous bars, shops, the sound of the rapids on the Bistrica make strolling in the center pleasant; the nightlife decidedly enlivened by thousands of young people roaming the venues along the river lets us spend the last hours in Prizren serenely.

Gracanica Monastery and Pristina

Early wake-up, breakfast and off we go to Gračanica, where we'll visit the Monastery, a Heritage of Humanity site. It takes us about 1 hour by car. We park comfortably in front of the site, then enter without paying any ticket and attend the Sunday service. There are no longer KFOR troops guarding the Monastery, but when a suspicious big man invites us to follow him we fear we've violated some law, or local custom, and though squirming and keeping him at a distance, we can do nothing but follow him to the side of the church; to our astonishment, he opens a small door and invites us to enter the church….

we realize that so far we've only seen the part dedicated to the celebration of the mass, but the "real" and ancient (from 1321) church is another one… we enter and admire frescoes partly damaged, partly restored, some still covered by scaffolding… this indeed is a UNESCO Heritage site!!! Ahead of schedule, my kind consort convinces me to make a quick stop in Pristina; my distrust of this city is not yet overcome, and our photo tour will be in "hop on hop off" tourist bus style. We leave the city in a very short time, and at around 12 we cross the border with Macedonia without difficulty.

Berat

9 o'clock. We re-enter Albania from the Macedonian border near Lake Ohrid and head toward Berat. Few will be the km we cover easily, often we'll find ourselves in line near construction sites, or tackling fair stretches of dirt road.

We reach Berat at 12; we park near the river, unable to find a road that takes us up to the fortress; the GPS proposes roads that would make your skin crawl and would put our safety at risk, and the sturdiness of my Clio… We tackle a climb on foot that is nothing short of demanding and when we reach the top we notice cars parked nearby (I think they landed with a spaceship!!!), though we have the chance to admire a Frenchman's car that with a small compact gets through the open construction site (they're repaving the climb) where the craters present seem to have no bottom… We pay 100 lek for entry to Berat Castle and find ourselves in a village from another time.

The fatigue is so great that at first we notice only a small bar where we can refresh ourselves and use the facilities; then we begin to wander through the fortified Citadel (Kala) among churches and stone houses; we reach the entrance of the Onufri museum and peek only from the outside at some of its numerous icons on display; although the site is of national interest, honestly I'm ignorant on the subject and not in the least interested in iconography, iconostasis, or any other icono-thing, so we continue our visit heading toward the panoramic viewpoint.

Truly evocative to look out and see on the other bank of the river the numerous houses with their countless windows perched on a hill, hence the name "city of a thousand windows"; struck by the landscape, we add to our after-lunch tour a visit with a photo shoot of lower Berat, from the Gorica bridge with a view of both neighborhoods, Mangalem and Gorica itself. But before lunch we're drawn to a passage along the walls that makes us take a wide loop around the fortress; we discover one of Berat's most charming and evocative spots, the Orthodox Church of the Holy Trinity, built on a steep slope. We head toward the exit from the fortress, descend the mountain and discover from reading our guides that Berat is also a place where Muslims and Christians have coexisted peacefully for centuries.

We take the last photos from the famous bridge, then leave the UNESCO Heritage city to head toward Gjirokastër. Departure at 3:30 PM, arrival at 6:30 PM, 3 hours to cover 150 km (!!) with super sporty driving to overcome all the levels of what increasingly appears to us as a video game in which the further you go, the more everything becomes difficult. I advise against inexperienced drivers getting on the road in these areas of Albania; beyond the effort given by the road surface in precarious condition for long stretches, we often saw Albanians engaging in overtaking far removed from sobriety.. I won't speak of safety because that's an obsolete word..

On the suggestion of the receptionist at our hotel in Gjirokastër we immediately head up toward the castle, first by car to the parking lot near the bazaar, and then on foot (considerable incline!), but to our disappointment we find it already closed for a while. We wander around the bazaar, then have dinner at the restaurant suggested by the same receptionist, this time with better luck!

from Gjirokastra to the Albanian coast

Entry to Gjirokastër Castle costs just 200 lek, but to go all around it, including the prisons and the weapons museum, once you've walked the entire inner courtyard you'll find another guard ready to issue a new ticket… I suggest buying the second ticket too, it's really worth it; also interesting is the walk inside the walls that from the cannon courtyard leads to the Clock Tower, where we'll read the story of Princess Argjiro. Having finished the visit to the castle around 11 we get back on the road heading toward the Albanian coast; we allow ourselves a single stop at the Blue Eye, after about an hour of travel; we pay 200 lek to access a dirt and dusty stretch, about a couple of km, which leads us to a parking lot behind the site; some walked it on foot to avoid the car jam… but under the sun and amid the chaos, I suggest following our example.

Following the crowd, we arrive at the spring, ice-cold and crystal-clear, which rises from underground and feeds the river; we elbow our way up to a small ledge from which the great blue eye is best admired.

Since my consort needs to use the facilities on site, I grab a quick snack at the bar, and I pay for it as much as a decent dinner on the Albanian riviera! We continue our journey toward the coast, we arrive in the early afternoon at the Nebo Hotel in Ksamil; we have trouble with the GPS and have to ask locals for directions to find the hotel; the establishment, though new, doesn't make a good impression on us, and the disservice caused to us by a price increase (a month after the online booking!) for reasons not better specified by Booking.com makes me quite angry and doubtful about the reliability of the managers; to be generous let's say that the welcome and treatment are spartan, as is the à la carte breakfast that will be offered to us the next day, strictly after 8:30.

Returning to the present, we relax as much as possible for a few minutes, then decide to have lunch at the nearby pizzeria; we return to the hotel only to change, then reach the nearby beach about 200 meters away. The weather conditions promise nothing good and my kind consort is chomping at the bit to find a place to lay out her towel and dive into the sea; I have a hard time dragging her toward the beach in front of the first islet, where we find a space to settle. Without spending a single lek, contrary to what's written in the numerous forums and travel diaries on the internet, we manage to find a spot on one of the most renowned beaches of the entire Albanian coast.

To tell the truth, the limited spaces available, the confusion and the lurking clouds don't make us shout with joy; we stay a couple of hours, then decide to move to the seafront to get a better view of the three islands and the leisure possibilities for the next day. We inquire about pedal boat prices. Then we have a cocktail at a venue with a view of Tre Ishujt. A walk back to the hotel, then relax, dinner at a venue on the main street mostly frequented by Italians, and planning for the day ahead.

Ksamil and Saranda

After the spartan breakfast we head toward one of the most important parks in Albania. Entry to Butrint National Park costs 700 lek, but I'll pay far more than that crossing the channel with the car on a very costly raft at 5 euros per crossing.. total 10 euros round trip.. to see the Venetian castle up close, and realize that the archaeological area of interest is on the other bank. Back on the right path we enter the park and after passing the Venetian Tower we follow the route that from the main avenue leads to the Ancient Theater, and take a leap into the past, back to the 8th century BC, we see the remains of the mythological city founded by the exiles of Troy, then colonized by Romans, Greeks, Byzantines, Venetians and Ottomans.

We go from the Baths to the Acropolis, to the Sanctuary and the Baptistery, and to the Venetian Castle; the site is an open-air history book, declared a UNESCO Heritage site in 1992. We return to Ksamil; in the afternoon, sea, the consort demands it, in the meantime we decide to take a pedal boat ride (at 2 PM, 1 hour) and disembark on at least one of the Ksamil islets, then relax on a beach in front of the southernmost islet. Our plan turns out to be spot-on because we finish the pedal boat ride, after having been on a pebble beach on one of the islets, just as it starts to rain.

Back at the hotel, we relax a bit, then decide to move toward a well-publicized beach in the northern area, and afterward take a walk in the very renowned and very chaotic Saranda! The beach is on the road that leads from Ksamil to Saranda, Manastirit; we park the car at the beginning of the climb because I fear I won't be able to make it back up the incredible incline with my compact car; the beach is simply spectacular and, due to the afternoon bad weather, deserted. We move toward Saranda and with difficulty manage to park, we stroll for about an hour along the seafront but the excessive confusion makes us give up looking for a place for dinner; the town is certainly pleasant, sized for vacationers. We return to Ksamil where we have dinner at the same place as the previous evening, then return to the hotel to pack our bags for the next day.

the Albanian coast from south to north

Time to go home. We leave early in the morning, at the hotel we leave the keys at the reception, the owners the night before warned us that they don't wake up before 8!!! Along the road we spot numerous and interesting beaches. First stop at Borsh at the Veranda Ulica; hard to find parking, from the outside the place is absolutely anonymous, it wouldn't invite anyone to stop for breakfast; we enter and instead find ourselves in the middle of a waterfall, on rock spurs tables and chairs have been set up; in this evocative setting I have a house frittata and a good coffee.

The next stop is Porto Palermo, the Fortress of Ali Pasha rises in the middle of the sea, and carries with it a controversial history even regarding its construction; it's said, among the many stories, that it was a Soviet submarine base in Albania, but we Italians remember it because it was our outpost used last century as a prison. The Castle appears well preserved, the setting evocative; too bad the access to the beach and the islet (joined to the mainland only by a tiny strip of sand) is disfigured by garbage at the edge of the road. Satisfied we get back in the car and stop a couple of times along the road to admire the immense beaches that will accompany us for tens of km northward, from Himarë onward it's a succession of breathtaking landscapes.

Unfortunately we witness numerous accidents along the coastal road; both Albanians and reckless young tourists, sometimes even Italians, fail to respect the highway code. Continuing the journey northward, we stop at Zvërnec, on the Narta lagoon; found by chance while browsing the internet, it proves to be a landscape destination worthy of respect, with a wooden walkway joining the islet to the mainland, and with a cypress grove covering a beautiful monastery. The last stop of our trip in Albania, before heading to the port of Durrës, is Apollonia. We pay 400 lek for entry, parking outside is free, and we decide to have lunch before devoting ourselves to visiting the site; we refresh ourselves while watching a Formula 1 race on TV together with the owners.

The stop is brief, duty awaits us; at 4 PM we begin the tour of the ruins of the archaeological site, founded by the Greeks 2500 years ago; the site map misleads us, and after seeing the Odeon and the Triumphal Arch near the entrance we'll search for the Acropolis and other points of interest going around the entire site twice, until we convince ourselves of the fact that ruins… by definition… imply that little.. or nothing!! remains of the original architecture. The signage inside the park is absolutely non-existent. Before returning to our car we visit the Monastery. In short, it may well be a place of notable historical and cultural interest, but there's very little to see, especially for Italians used to being amazed by quite other beauties!! At 5:30 PM we leave, destination Durrës. In the evening we'll take the ferry that will bring us back to Italy.